Home pride as David De Gea comes of age

David de Gea will walk tall back home in Madrid tonight.

The 22-year-old returns to the Spanish city where he played all his football with Atletico until his £20m move to United in the summer of 2011.

And it has been a tough education in the school of hard knocks that is the English Premier League for the keeper.

De Gea has been unable to shake off criticism over his form and debate about his future but Sir Alex Ferguson believes his No 1 is making strides.

“David has shown his character because he has taken a lot of criticism and sometimes unfair criticism,” he said.

“But what we're good at is developing people as players and their character. He came to us as a very young man, not used to the English game and couldn’t speak the language. He was still to mature physically in the English game.

“Bit by bit it’s a like a young kid taking his first steps forward, he wobbles, gets up, wobbles again, gets up again and eventually he walks. The boy is walking now.”

De Gea believes he’s now a better goalkeeper than the one who walked through the Old Trafford doors to replace Edwin van der Sar.

“Of course, when you arrive at a new club it is normal there will be low points,” he said. “The important thing is to learn from them and improve. I know I am much better than when I first arrived at Manchester United.”

De Gea’s stock would certainly take a huge jump forward if he could blank out Cristiano Ronaldo in the Bernabeu.

“Everyone knows how well Ronaldo can play. It is very hard to save his shots,” he said.

Our newspapers include the flagship Manchester Evening News - Britain's largest circulating
regional daily with up to 130,485 copies - as well as 20 local weekly titles across Greater
Manchester, Cheshire and Lancashire.

Free morning newspaper, The Metro, published every weekday, is also part of our portfolio,
delivering more than 200,000 readers in Greater Manchester.

Greater Manchester Business Week is the region’s number one provider of business news andfeatures, targeting a bespoke business audience with 12,687 copies every Thursday.

Every month, M.E.N. Media’s print products reach 2.2 million adults, spanning from Accrington
in the north to Macclesfield in the south.